Swachh Bharat Kosh reserves crores to back Modi’s Abhiyan

Receiving triple digit funds in the last three years, “Swachh Bharat Kosh” gets a recent hefty cheque from NCL

Swachh Bharat Kosh, a government funding that drives the motive of cleanliness across the country, is attracting heavy donations under CSR. Previously recorded deposits exceeded double digit numbers, with an estimate of more than 650 been received under the initiative.

Indian companies have also been actively indulging in CSR activities as a part of the mandate provision to provide a contribution of 2 per cent of the average net profits. With Swachh Bharat Kosh, a step in the direction of Clean India has been made, as envisioned by our Prime Minister. It is established under the Department of Expenditure, Ministry of finance in central government.
Receiving a hefty donation from the Northern Coalfields Limited (NCL), a Coal India subsidiary, Swachh Bharat Kosh bagged a sum of Rs 1 crore recently.

An NCL statement said last week that it had been contributing to Swachh Bharat mission regularly by undertaking various activities such as:

• Cleanliness drive
• Organizing mass awareness program
• Mobilizing masses through various programmes

However, people have been nothing short of outraged with the unprecedented fund supplies the government extracted through Swachh Cess. The latter is seen falling short of the authentic motive it commenced, and is seen as a medium to impose extra taxes.

Also the problem of toilets built under Swachh Bharat have started to aggravate. The defecation utilities are dysfunctional and unusable, and fail the sanitation objective they were purposed for. “Till the time the problem of toilets becoming dysfunctional is not tackled seriously by the Ministry, the objective of full household sanitation coverage would remain a distant dream,” said the committee on rural development.

With plenty of funds supporting Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, is it fulfilling the actual promise it originally held? Or are these funds sourcing government’s unsolicited expenses in the name of encouraging cleanliness?